What it Means to be Palestinian

Dina Matar
Paperback, 232 pages
9781848853638

Stories of Palestinian Peoplehood

What It Means to be Palestinian is a narrative of narratives, a collection of personal stories, remembered feelings and reconstructed experiences by different Palestinians whose lives were changed and shaped by history. Their stories are told chronologically through particular phases of the Palestinian national struggle, providing a composite autobiography of Palestine as a landscape and as a people. The book begins with the 1936 revolt against British rule in Palestine and ends in 1993, with the Oslo peace agreement that changed the nature and form of the national struggle. It is based on in-depth interviews and conversations with Palestinians, male and female, old and young, rich and poor, religious and secular, in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Israel and the Occupied Territories. Presented as remembered personal narratives and as 'social' histories, these conversations provide a deep & intimate account of what it means to be Palestinian in the 21st century.

Contents
1: Palestine as a Landscape and a People: On the road to Nakba 
2: Living the Nakba: In the Perilous Territory of not-Belonging
3: Between Romance and Tragedy
4: Living the Revolution: Living the Occupation
5: Children of the Stone: Living the first intifada
Epilogue